Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1887-01-05
THE NEvA RIVER.
The Beauty. Purity and Pictures.
qucncss of This Northern Wa
ter-COurse

A mere neck Of earth separates the
Russian capital from the great inland
sea of Ladoga, and through more than
forty intervening versts Of forest land,
green and wavy with the trembling Us
pen, tile birch, the alder and the silver
pine, the Neva moves majestically
down its deep channel, by villages and
c.earings, past scattered communes
and struggling huts, between sounding
wood yards and busy factories, till at
last, gliding along the famed granite
quays of the imperial city, it pours by
five broad mouths and narrow outlets
lunumberable into the Gulf of Finland.
No Russian river has the beauty, the
purity, the picturesqueness, which are
the attributes of this northern water
course; yet to fully appreciate the no
bleness of Its aspect in the warm sea-
son, one must be familiar with its win
try appearance, and above all witness
It's vernal emancipation from the fetters
of frost by ukase of the 'father of
WARMTH the Slav Apollo, Dazh-Bog
himself. For nearly SIX months a ring
ing highway for man and beast, the
Neva grows unsafe for travel late in
the month of April, and has usually re-
sumed its freedom by the beginning of
May; yet the opening of the attack on
the crystalline mass procedes the mo-
ment of its melting by weeks. A
month sometimes elapseS before the
solar rays have begun to sensibly thin
the ice crust, aud for a month of SEEM
ing defiance of the forces of renaissance
droskies pursue their chosen paths over
the CONCEALED river, pedestrians contin-
ue TO traverse it in chair slides or on
foot, the heavy wagons of merchant
and trader so rumbling over IN the
same endless procession, and the Sam
oyeds, those Gypsies of the north, cling
with their RENDERS to the camping
ground of their winter exile on the fro
zen stream, which is soon to bear them
back to their homes in the Arctic cir
Gle.
The metamorphosist then follows with
swiftness truly Russian. The last
screws and clasps of molecular cohesion
are drawn in single night; the thick
est ice-plate then opens 10 its solar
enemy thousand lines of march. In
the morning, with firm, quick steps.
you may safely traverse the Neva, still
ice-covered; at noon, your return Is
barred by a clear, swelling stream,
whose Mhim bonds have turned to dane
ing liquid facets, from which the sun
laag6A back its light and its triumph.
True, He ice is not yet wholly gone.
but II, neets the eye henceforth purely
as a sp&ctaele-the offering not OF a
river, &Sf lake. This new ice is
the prodpct of more northern waters,
the snowy blocks and bergs OF Ladoga,
glittertng aetris of an unequal combat
that every spring renews. For some
days afetr the breakins-up along the
Neva, in the internal between the be-
ginning of open and that OF safe navi-
CATION, the river channel is thronged
with broken strata, cleft blocks, trun-
oasad pillars, ssIivessd columns; With
spires anu spears and shafts; nay, with
al shapetul and shapelesS masses, that
half undergo and half escape degelatiOn
in the annual return of heat to the far
Gorth. Slowly the rank and file of this
shining host glide past, driving back to
shelter fleet of ventureSome ferry
boats, battering the bridge piers with
dangerous force and frequency, scrap
ing the quays with a sonorous attrition,
and emitting throughout the duration
of their passage strange rustling,
crunching sound. By day striking, by
night solemn and weird, this scene pas
ses in its turn, and for six months the
Neva presents the aspect which l have
described in the opening paragraph.